My favorite thing to do when I arrive in a new city is to find the closest local bookstore. Not only are they great spaces for relaxing or meeting people, but they often lead to the discovery of local authors and events and provide a sense of the histories, nuances, and people of the city.

Whether you’re new to Seattle, just passing through, or a local looking for new adventures, the University of Washington Press has an expansive array of books to help you discover our city. They cover everything from Seattle’s intertwined urban and Native histories, the evolution of Seattle’s gay communities, growing up Japanese American during World War II, local activism and civil rights, the plight and reclamation of our river, the history of music in Seattle, of animals, topography, food, art and architecture, and weather! We hope you’ll consider stopping by your indie bookstore and checking for our W logo in the stacks of books.

And once you’re ready, here are some fun places to read while exploring your new city!

We’re excited to announce that several UW Books have recently garnered awards, have been longlisted, or named as finalists. Two in particular have received recognition for their contributions to both scholarly and general-reader understandings of Pacific Northwest architecture and Western environmental history:

Shaping Seattle Architecture has been honored as this year’s Architectural Heritage Publication by Historic Seattle, a nonprofit group dedicated to preserving the city’s urban heritage. The 7th Annual Preservation Awards will be held on May 12 and tickets are available online.

Now in its second edition, Shaping Seattle Architecture showcases the work of those who were instrumental in creating our region’s built environment, situating developments in Seattle building design within local and global contexts. Four individuals newly included in the second edition include Edwin J. Ivey, a leading residential designer; Fred Bassetti, an important contributor to Northwest regional modernism; L. Jane Hastings, one of the region’s foremost women in architecture; and Richard Haag, founder of the landscape architecture program at the University of Washington and designer of Gas Works Park and the Bloedel Reserve.

Vacationland won the International Ski History Association’s Skade Award, which honors an outstanding work on regional ski history or an outstanding book focused in part on ski history. Vacationland was also the winner of the Western Writers of America 2014 Spur Award for best contemporary Western nonfiction.

Philpott shows how the Colorado high country was dramatically transformed into a national vacation destination in the decades following World War Two. This brought a new kind of environmental politics as tourists demanded protection for the aesthetic and recreational qualities that promoters had billed. Those demands energized the American environmental movement–but also created blind spots that still plague Colorado today.

Longlisted in the social sciences category, Puer Tea tells the story of how the ancient leaf’s noble lineage and unique process of aging and fermentation was rediscovered in the 1990s, helping it achieve cult status both in China and internationally. The tea became a favorite among urban connoisseurs who analyzed it in language comparable to that used in wine appreciation and paid skyrocketing prices.

In 2007, however, local events and the international economic crisis caused the Puer market to collapse. Anthropologist Jinghong Zhang traces the rise, climax, and crash of this phenomenon. With ethnographic attention to the spaces in which Puer tea is harvested, processed, traded, and consumed, she constructs a vivid account of the transformation of a cottage handicraft into a major industry–with predictable risks and unexpected consequences.

Longlisted in the humanities category, Bodies in Balance is the first comprehensive, interdisciplinary exploration of the triangular relationship among the Tibetan art and science of healing (Sowa Rigpa), Buddhism, and arts and crafts. This book is dedicated to the history, theory, and practice of Tibetan medicine, a unique and complex system of understanding body and mind, treating illness, and fostering health and well-being.

Developed within the context of Buddhism, Tibetan medicine was adapted over centuries to different health needs and climates across the region encompassing the Tibetan Plateau, the Himalayas, and Mongolia. Generously illustrated with more than 200 images, Bodies in Balance includes essays on contemporary practice, pharmacology and compounding medicines, astrology and divination, history and foundational treatises. The volume brings to life the theory and practice of this ancient healing art.

Finally, we’re excited to also announce that two additional books have been named as finalists for awards:

A finalist for the Western Writers of America 2015 Spur Award in contemporary Nonfiction, Wilderburbs explores how roads, houses, and water development transformed the Western rural landscape. Bramwell introduces readers to developers, homeowners, and government regulators, all of whom have faced unexpected environmental problems in designing and building wilderburb communities, including unpredictable water supplies, threats from wildfires, and encounters with wildlife.

By looking at wilderburbs in the West, especially in Utah, Colorado, and New Mexico, Bramwell uncovers the profound environmental consequences of Americans’ desire to live in the wilderness.

A finalist for the BC Book Prize/Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize, Great Bear Wild is a journey from the headwaters of the Great Bear Rainforest’s unexplored river valleys to where the ocean meets the rainforest and, finally, to the hidden depths of the offshore world.

Rich with full-color photographs of the wolves, whales, and other creatures who make the rainforest their home, Great Bear Wild is a stunning celebration of this legendary place. Ian McAllister is a cofounder of the wildlife conservation organization Pacific Wild and the award-winning photographer and author of The Last Wild Wolves. Time magazine named him one of the “Leaders of the 21st Century.”